


Supermarket Flowers

by XladyXdimitresuX



Category: Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse)
Genre: Alcohol, Character Death, Death, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Sorry, Major Illness, Other, Terminal Illnesses, Why Did I Write This?, i hurt so you will hurt too
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-13 03:47:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29520393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XladyXdimitresuX/pseuds/XladyXdimitresuX
Summary: "Dani laid down on the fresh dirt of her mother’s grave and poured more of the cheap whiskey down her throat, it burned less than the pain in her chest. She stared at the stars in the sky and rambled to her mother about all of the things she wished she would’ve told her when she was alive."In other words, I am sad and this is a human AU (poorly and quickly) written from Dani's perspective
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	1. A Heart That's Broke Is A Heart That's Been Loved

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Please, just say something. I feel like I’m drowning, I can’t breathe anymore and you know it’s because you took me down there with you. There’s just a part of me stuck up here too.” Dani pressed her ear to the ground and started to openly cry. “I’m sorry you got sick, mama, I tried to fix you. I did everything I could, but I couldn’t save you. The doctors told me I did everything right but it was too much for your body, but I know I should’ve tried harder.”

“Fuck this, fuck this, fuck this!” Dani screamed at the wall as she smashed the vase of flowers into it as hard as she could. Tiffany and Sofia stood behind and watched with quiet fear and tears rolling down their own cheeks. Dani picked each rose up, the glass and thorns cutting into her skin, and crushed them one by one. The blood of the roses and her own blood mixing together until no one could tell which was which. “She would fucking hate these! She hated roses, why do people just assume that people want flowers when people die?!” 

“It was just a nice gesture…” Tiffany starts but quickly shuts up when Dani turns and glares at her. Tiffany cowers and Sofia wraps an arm around the young girl’s shoulder, who then curls into Sofia’s chest to sob.

“Daniela, stop this, now. She wasn’t just your mother, she was ours too. We loved her and so did many other people.” Sofia’s voice is stern and strong despite the fact that she was crying.

“Don’t… Don’t you fucking dare try to sound like her.” Dani shoved a shaking finger in Sofia’s face. “You will not replace her. No one fucking will.” With that Dani grabbed the nearest bottle of liquor and stormed out of the house.

The funeral had been two days before Dani finally broke down and everyone was honestly shocked that she lasted this long. Everyone saw this coming; Alcina had been sick for years by the time the disease finally took over, but that didn’t make the sting hurt less. Tiffany didn’t know where to go now, she was only 16 and her sisters were only 20 and 22. The only option was their grandmother, Alcina’s mother, who wasn’t the most supportive or kind to any of them. Tiffany was scared and Sofia was fighting to keep her. One adoption was enough for a person, now she had to go through another. 

Dani laid down on the fresh dirt of her mother’s grave and poured more of the cheap whiskey down her throat, it burned less than the pain in her chest. She stared at the stars in the sky and rambled to her mother about all of the things she wished she would’ve told her when she was alive.

“Mama, remember when I was like ten and we broke your favorite statuette thing?” She is silent as if waiting for a response. “I told you it was Tiffany but it was actually me.”

“And when I broke that window, I’m sorry about that too. And all the times I hit my sisters, and all the times I argued with them, I’m sorry.” Dani sniffled and drank some more. “Mama, thanks for adopting me. I know I wasn’t an easy kid but you saved me from all that bad stuff. I think I would’ve died without you. You never gave up on me, or Soapy, or Laughy Taffy. Your ladybugs. I used to hate when you called me that but I would give anything to hear you call me that again.”

“Please, just say something. I feel like I’m drowning, I can’t breathe anymore and you know it’s because you took me down there with you. There’s just a part of me stuck up here too.” Dani pressed her ear to the ground and started to openly cry. “I’m sorry you got sick, mama, I tried to fix you. I did everything I could, but I couldn’t save you. The doctors told me I did everything right but it was too much for your body, but I know I should’ve tried harder.” 

Dani closed her eyes and pretended that she was anywhere there when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She looked up and saw a figure standing over her. “M-mama?” 

“Hi little ladybug.” Alcina’s voice echoed in Dani’s ear, it sounded like her but so far away. She took a seat next to Dani and pulled her daughter into her lap. Dani scrambled to hang onto her mother and Alcina rocked her gently. Dani closed her eyes and started to drift but her mother stopped her. Alcina placed a hand on Dani’s cheek and smiled sadly at her. “I’m afraid you can’t stay here with me, my sweet.”

“W-why?” Dani swallowed hard against the lump in her throat. Alcina kissed Dani’s forehead and laid her back down on the dirt. “Mama, please… Don’t leave. I can’t do this, I need you.”  
“You can do this.” Alcina winked and stood. “You’re a Dimitrescu, aren’t you? We are strong and we don’t give up, we can do anything. This will hurt for a long time, and you will never see me on this earth again, but one day you will wake up and you will be washed over with a sense of freedom from this pain. You may always miss me, but you will be alright, my child. I raised you to be okay.” 

Alcina started to walk away and Dani reached for her down but her hand fell through it, just as she started to fall through the ground beneath her. She was swirling through darkness and dirt tumbling through nothing and everything at once until she landed with a jolt in a hospital bed. Dani jerked awake and called out for her mother but all she found are her two sisters and her uncle at the foot of her bed. 

“Hey, look, the little shit’s awake.” Heisenberg, her mother’s brother, said with a wavering voice. There was no malice in his voice, for them that was affectionate. Dani furrowed her brows and looked around the room again before focusing back on her uncle. He’d been crying. So had her sisters. 

“What the hell were you thinking?” Sofia’s voice was angry, a sound Dani was more familiar with. “We found you half frozen to death on mother’s grave. You nearly died. Why would you do that to us?” 

“She told me to come back…” Dani’s throat was sore and her voice was hoarse, surprising her. “I saw her.” 

Sofia opened and closed her mouth, ready to tell her that it was nonsense but let her believe whatever she wanted to. Tiffany believed her though and curled up next to Dani to listen to everything she had to say about the experience. 

“I told her the truth about the stupid statuette.” Dani laughed a genuine laugh and everyone’s face snapped to her. “She told me I’m going to be okay… We’re all going to be okay.”


	2. Unsteady

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s progressed. There is no chance for remission, there is no more treatment, there is nothing else. This is the end of the line, my sweet.” Alcina seems peaceful and that makes Dani angry. She wishes she could feel anything but angry. “I’m ready, it's okay. The medicine will help keep me comfortable until I slip away. It won’t be painful.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a prequel to Supermarket Flowers... cause i enjoy pain

This time wouldn’t be any different than the last: Dani would pack up her bag, kiss her girlfriend goodbye and go stay with her mom for a few weeks. They’d go to doctors appointments, she’d give her mother poisonous cocktails through an IV that made Dani question how it even helped, and then she’d take the long drive back home. Every time the disease recurred the four of them; her two sisters and their mother, would spend hours discussing what the game plan was going to be. It never changed. Sofia was always too busy with school halfway across the country and god forbid anyone asked her to come care for her dying mother. Then there was Tiffany, the baby, she lived with Alcina but at 16 and in high school there wasn’t much the poor kid could do for their mother. So that was the end of it. 

This last call felt different, Alcina felt more desperate for Dani to come, for both her and Sofia to come. Sofia made a promise to come at the end of the semester and Dani swore at her for five minutes while Alcina tried to calm her and Tiffany cried. Mother was dying and Sofia was wasting precious time with her. Dani told Sofia to go fuck herself and hung up and hasn’t spoken to her since. That was two weeks ago. Now as Dani pulls into the long drive of the mansion just beyond the family vineyard, she wants to vomit. How much longer would they have to do this? How much longer could their mother hold on like this?

It took her a full five minutes of standing outside the front door before she was finally able to knock. From the other side of the door Dani can hear the wheels of the IV stand getting louder as her mother approaches the door and as the door opens Dani’s breath leaves her body. Alcina has never looked this horrible. Her face was a hollow shell of what it used to be, dark empty eyes, unnaturally protruding cheekbones; but her smile was still warm and still felt like home. Dani refused to hug her, she couldn’t bring herself to do it, that wouldn’t feel like her mom. 

“Hello, little ladybug.” Her voice doesn’t even sound right. It’s tired, raspy, just sick. Dani can’t even explain it any better than sick. “Oh, Daniela, please stop staring at me. I know I look atrocious, I have to see myself everyday.”

“You always look beautiful, mother.” Dani’s comment is quick and she brushes it off as quickly as it comes out. “Where’s Laughy Taffy?” Dani crosses into the foyer and throws her bag down next to the stairs to deal with later. The house smells more and more like a hospital the closer Dani gets to her mother’s bedroom. It feels far more familiar than the sickly sweet artificial scents her mother kept to try to cover the smell of disinfectants and latex gloves. Dani can’t help herself when she passes by but to open the door and peak inside. The sight should fill her with sadness but it makes her angry. The machines’ gentle hums sound more like laughs mocking Dani, the hospital bed sitting at 45 degree feels like it is sitting up and judging her, the pepto-pink emesis buckets stacked nearby make her nauseous. This just had to happen to their family. This just had to ruin their lives. 

“They brought a new machine last week.” Tiffany’s soft melodic voice interrupts Dani from the rage building in her chest. “It’s so she can do all of her treatments at home now. I can show you how it works.”

Dani turns around and all but throws herself at her sister, pulling her not so little sister into her arms. “You can show me that stuff later. I wanna know about how you’re doing. You’re like 6 feet talk now, right? Almost as tall as mother.” 

“Yeah… Last doctor's appointment I was around 5’8” or something.” Tiffany shrugs it off, trying to act like she wasn’t proud of her height, like she didn’t love towering over her older sister. 

“Why did you have to go to the doctor?” That word was like a bad omen in this house. It left their mouths feeling dry and their skin crawling.

“Just my yearly physical for tennis. Don’t worry.” But worry was the only thing that they could do in this family. Every second was spent worrying whether or not Alcina was going to have another nose bleed, or if she was going to be able to get out of her chair, or if she would even wake up in the fucking morning.   
“So, has she talked much about this with you? Or is she keeping everything to herself again? The doctor had to call me again this time because she wouldn’t.” Dani tries to keep it casual as if this is the kind of conversation they have everyday, though at this point that’s what it was turning into. Tiffany’s face grows solemn and grows dark. 

“She won’t tell me anything, neither will the doctors, but I know it’s worse. She is so sick. She throws up all night and her medicine is stronger and sometimes she doesn’t remember who I am…” Tiffany starts hyperventilating and Dani hugs her once again.

“Hey, hey. Don’t worry about it. It’s gonna be just like last time, okay? She’s gonna be sick for awhile, I’ll be here for a few months then she’ll start to feel a little better, then she’ll go back into remission.” Dani assures Tiffany, not realizing that their mother was standing behind them listening to everything.

“Tiff, my sweet, will you go grab my pill box from the kitchen? I forgot it before dragging myself up here.” Alcina makes them jump with her sudden appearance. Tiffany bounds down the stairs, ready and willing to do anything for her mother at any moment. “Dani, come here. We need to speak.” 

They sit on the edge of the thin, firm hospital grade mattress and Dani knows the bad news is coming: a new prognosis. 

“How long? Just tell me.” Dani looks down at the beige carpet, focusing on a faded stain where she had spilled grape juice when she was 6. 

“Daniela… please.” Alcina reaches for her child’s hand but she pulls away. “Three months.”

Suddenly, Dani feels like she’s going to pass out. That’s the shortest time they’ve ever given her. Nothing hurt this bad, nothing had ever knocked the air out of her lungs like this just did. “Wh-Why? What happened? You’ve always been able to manage this and you’ve always been able to come back from this. You’ll be fine.”

“Ladybug, we always knew this would happen.” Alcina is trying to be gentle but that isn’t what Dani needs. Dani needs to know now.

“Mother, tell me, now.”

“It’s progressed. There is no chance for remission, there is no more treatment, there is nothing else. This is the end of the line, my sweet.” Alcina seems peaceful and that makes Dani angry. She wishes she could feel anything but angry. “I’m ready, it's okay. The medicine will help keep me comfortable until I slip away. It won’t be painful.”

“For you…” Dani’s eyes burn. “What about Tiffany? Are you just going to keep lying to her? She thinks you’re going to get better!” Dani doesn’t want to yell at the poor fragile woman but it just comes out but before she knows it her mother’s arms are wrapped around her holding her tight. 

“We’re all going to be okay.”


End file.
